Art Institute Graduates 2008!!!

On the 17th, some members of our team completed their coursework at AI, and showcased all of their hard, and impressive work. Kalen, Memo, Hayley, and William proudly stood in front of monitors displaying their stuff. Congratulations guys!!!! We got rained out this day, so we Dan, Eder, Randy, Manny, Kara, CeCe, Xavier, and myself checked it out and snapped some shots of the only artists in the room we gave a crap about.

Kalen and Memo's gigantic head. Kalen had impressive digital illustrations, while Memo's Head had some amazing 3d renderings.

Hayley and her animation work

Will and his digital magic.

Yep!!

Kaman's End of the Season Employee Party

Edge of Shaun, Kyle-Ruben, Jose-Ricardo-Werito, his girl, Dude #3, Lindsey, and Amanda

Ummm...it's dark, but Shawn, Bonnie, Kirsten, Kara, Randy, Julia, Jordan, Jade

The lady who actually goes out in public with me, CeCe, and Bonita with her fanciful flower. (We had a sitter for Xavier, but as you can see, we weren't able to leave son #2, Brodie Fawkes Holt behind.)

Kathy said I was dressed like a Catholic Priest. So I blessed her.

We drew names for stuff with the Kaman's logo on it, notepads, pens, calculators, water bottles, and the coolest one, a messenger bag. Serge anticlimactically won it after I found out the name for the next item had already been called. Dastardly.

Nobel poet laureate Aly, EZ, Jac, Mike, Randy, and Kara

Edge of Brick, Jaclyn, Eder, Randy, his wife Kara, Val, and Memo's head.

Our District Manager Kathy, Kim, and I.

Memo's head, Eder, Erika, and Brick.

Shellee, Jodi, Val, her husband, Parnaz, and her dude.

Will, Serge, Jac, Kim and Erika (?), Debbie, Rory, and Manny

Coleen, Ami, Ami's dude, Gehl, Liska, and Magaly

Athena's cop-dude, Athena, Jess. Meredith, Mary Christina Meyer, Rachel, her dude, Jensine, and Tanya

Fake-happy Randy, Julia, her dude, Shaun, and a hand that is pretending to fire a small handgun

Jade, her son Jordan, his pet dolphin, and Memo's head

People standing in awe and admiration of equally spaced out green squares on the table. "How'd they do that?" one says. "Witchcraft." replies another. Meredith looks on in disapproval.

So...our holiday party was really nice, and very well attended. It was nice seeing you guys dressed in human clothes, and I'm proud of how the overall event went. Special thanks again to the House of Blues for helping us out-it's amazing how far a contract written in human blood trading your soul will get you. Hope you enjoyed it, since Kimberly, Dan, and I will be spending the rest of eternity with Jake and Elwood in the hot place. Here are pictures CeCe (part-time receptionist, full-time wife) took of the festivities. If anyone else has pics they would like posted, please send them along, I'll put them up too. Oh, and the Flash on the camera was being lame, so a few pics are pretty dark. Sorry!

DISNEY EMPLOYEE PARTY

So, Apparently once a year, we can get tickets to four hours of a DisneyLand free of the annoying guests, and instead filled with the annoying Disney employees. It IS a lot of fun though. You get a free ornament, are handed candy canes every twelve feet, and whenever it's time to take a group shot in front of the castle at the time Richard said (not the time he said he said) people are going to run a little late. But a lot of people made it...of course there were a few members of management who were too busy to join us (yes Dan, I'm very glad that your custom built lightsaber was 50% off, but c'mon!--oh, it's a green one? I'll let it slide). Anyways, I think most people were surprised by how fun it was to go to our place of work off the clock, and fun was had all around.

For the record, a group of us went to our free photo op at Princess Fantasy Faire just before midnight. And...let's just say that the princesses on duty looked like the late shift. It was JV squad all the way. Later Randy compared them the exotic dancers on duty at 10 am...inappropriate Mr. Miller. But true.

Kaman's Elite Event

Kaman's Elite Gala Event (from November)

Ricardo "Werito" Rodriguez had the single highest score earned in a day this year.

The man, the legend, the guy whose signature is on your check.

The amazingly adorable and talented president of our company, Tricia Kaman, and our regional manager Steve Fishwick.

Rich is most likely wondering when we will be getting a caricature stand at Disney.

Ricardo receiving his award.

Katherine receiving her award. Waitaminit! Who took this picture?

Kimberly receiving her award and maybe telling me  there's something on my  face right there.

Steve hoping I will be able to read the names on the awards. Words are hard.

On the way down, Kimberly had me suddenly pull over to see this. It was the first California sunset I had actually watched.

...um...Kaman's Art Shoppes celebrates its shoe diversity, upholding a long tradition of celebrating shoes of all sizes, shapes, and colors.

The Kaman's Elite is an exclusive honor within our company that was designed to celebrate our art machines, those artists who within a single day can do ungodly numbers. Here at Disney, those numbers are $1000 in a single day at portraits, $1200 in a single day at Face Paint, and $1400 in a single day at Letter Brush. This year Kimberly, Dan, Bonnie, Katherine, and Ricardo all pulled ridiculous shifts to attain their standing. The fiscal year just ended, and with that came the celebratory gala event down in San Diego, with the Elite members from the 8 other accounts spread across California. There were about 60 people in attendance, with each manager recognizing their own "elite". Katherine snapped a few shots during the award presentations, so without further ado, here they are above. (Thanks, Gehl).